L.A. mayor returns to public stage after acknowledging affair

July 10, 2007

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 1:17 p.m.

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Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa speaks with media at a press conference at the Green Dot Public Schools Headquarters in Los Angeles, Monday, July 9, 2007. At the press conference it was announced that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will spend $7.8 million to open 10 new high schools in the community served by the Alain Leroy Locke Senior High School in Watts. ( Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa speaks with media at a press conference at the Green Dot Public Schools Headquarters in Los Angeles, Monday, July 9, 2007. At the press conference it was announced that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will spend $7.8 million to open 10 new high schools in the community served by the Alain Leroy Locke Senior High School in Watts. The Associated Press, Ann Johansson

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa speaks with media at a press conference at the Green Dot Public Schools Headquarters in Los Angeles, Monday, July 9, 2007. At the press conference it was announced that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will spend $7.8 million to open 10 new high schools in the community served by the Alain Leroy Locke Senior High School in Watts. ( Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa speaks with media at a press conference at the Green Dot Public Schools Headquarters in Los Angeles, Monday, July 9, 2007. At the press conference it was announced that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will spend $7.8 million to open 10 new high schools in the community served by the Alain Leroy Locke Senior High School in Watts. The Associated Press, Ann Johansson

LOS ANGELES - Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa got a taste Monday of the difficult road ahead as he seeks to repair the damage to his image from disclosure of an extramarital affair with a local TV newscaster.

The first-term Democrat appeared in public for the first time since July 3 and sought to return the focus to city affairs by talking about pothole repairs and school funding. But the questions from the media throng were about his romance with Mirthala Salinas and the breakup of his marriage - issues that have overshadowed everything else at City Hall for a week.

The normally effusive Villaraigosa was noticeably subdued as he fielded the queries.

“I've obviously caused a great deal of pain to my family, to many people,” the mayor said.

He answered “no” when asked if he'd had any other affairs in the prior 18 months.

“I made a mistake,” he said. “I'm not perfect.”

Villaraigosa's reappearance in public marked a dividing line of sorts. Villaraigosa, 54, is roughly at the midpoint of his four-year term. In coming months he will need to rebuild his stock with voters by delivering on a list of unfulfilled promises, from a new subway line to better schools.

He said as much himself.

“I'm going to focus on my job and do the best job I can,” he said. “The people will have to evaluate me based on that.”

Villaraigosa came to office in a landslide election in 2005 after promising to reshape a city struggling with traffic congestion, dead-end schools and high-priced housing. He's had an uneven stretch in office, marked by the collapse of his plan to take control of the Los Angeles Unified School District.

The disclosures about his love life will make building momentum even more challenging.

“It is hurting him - the press isn't allowing him to talk about anything else right now,” said Tracy Westen of the Center for Governmental Studies, a nonpartisan research group in Los Angeles.

Michael Josephson, president of the Josephson Institute of Ethics in Los Angeles, said the mayor has clearly lost a share of public good will. But there are numerous examples, from Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, of politicians who have weathered romantic scandals in office, he noted.

“He'll never have the same image that he had before,” Josephson said. But “sexual indiscretions are normally not enough to defeat a person, if they otherwise keep their nose clean and do the things that voters expect them to do.”

The mayor is planning a string of events in coming days to beat back any impression that he's been sidetracked. They include announcing an increase in summer jobs for youth Tuesday, visiting the port on Wednesday to detail a clean-air initiative for locomotives and promoting energy conversation in the Van Nuys neighborhood on Thursday.

Meanwhile, his wife Corina, who filed for divorce, is planning to move to the family's Los Angeles home in coming days with their two children, a 14-year-old girl and 18-year-old son. She has been staying at the mayor's official residence.

Villaraigosa's staff would not say where he is staying in the interim, citing security concerns.

The other woman in the mayor's life - Salinas - remains on leave from KVEA, Spanish-language network Telemundo's local affiliate.

Salinas, 35, a reporter-anchor, once covered the mayor as a political reporter for the station. She was removed from the beat about 11 months ago.

Salinas was co-anchoring the evening newscast last month and read the story about Villaraigosa's announcement that he and his wife were divorcing. She did not mention her relationship with the mayor.

The station placed her on leave Thursday while it investigates whether her relationship with Villaraigosa breached journalistic ethics. The mayor said he expects her to be vindicated.

Villaraigosa spent his days in seclusion reaching out to family and friends for advice, including from former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown, who had his own bumpy personal life. Brown fathered a child with one of his fundraisers while separated from his wife.

Some politicians who survived personal scandal - most notably President Clinton - benefited by having wives who either stuck with them through the difficult times or did not seek to do further damage to their spouse. Villaraigosa's estranged wife has yet to make a public statement about the mayor.

When Villaraigosa and Corina wed in 1987, they merged their last names - his Villar and her Raigosa. The mayor will keep the Villaraigosa name, according to his office.

Working in Villaraigosa's favor is timing; he won't be up for re-election until 2009.

A key issue in the short term is whether disclosures about his personal life stop with the Salinas affair, said Steve Erie, a political scientist at the University of California, San Diego.

“If this is death of a thousand cuts - if other girlfriends surface - I think the damage will be far more extensive,” Erie said. “The real problem is if it becomes a continuing story.”

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